The Hardest Cases
by Daphne B
Summary: Some cases hit closer to home than others. When girls Rita has been counseling at Night Moves start showing up dead on the beaches of Palm Beach, Chris and Rita find themselves trying to stop a serial killer before he strikes again. They're going to need all the help they can get, even if it does mean working with the FBI.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: One of the things I always liked about the show was getting to see Chris and Rita interacting with other detectives and other friends. I especially liked that Rita was someone who had a number of close female friends from different areas of her life. This story explores that theme, and gave me a chance to write about Chris and Rita as they are seen through an outsider's eyes. It takes place generally around the end of Season 3, but there aren't any real spoilers. And it has some broad similarities with aspects of the case in Natural Selection (Season 4, eps 1 and 2), which is just me taking a bit of inspirational liberty from the screenwriters; the story isn't about that crime or those episodes.**

 **Chapter 1:**

Rita was pinching the bridge of her nose, taking deep breaths, trying to keep the tears from flowing. She was sad, yes, but more than that, she was angry. It was the anger she was trying to keep in check. Seeing this, Chris wove his way down the beach, through the cops who seemed to multiply exponentially whenever a particularly gruesome crime scene needed processing. As he pulled up next to Rita, she gave her head a small shake and settled her sunglasses back on her face.

Chris gently placed the palm of his hand on her back. Leaning his forehead on a spot just above her ear, he said softly, "Sammy, if you need to take a break from this case, no one will judge you. Why don't you go home for the day?"

"No, Chris." Rita nearly spat. She wasn't mad at him, but he was here, and so he bore the brunt of her anger. "When we catch this monster, I'm going to be right there putting cuffs on him. And until then, I'm going to be at work, trying like hell to make this guy squirm. To let him know he's being hunted."

Chris nodded. "Okay, Sam."

Rita's voice was still hard, but now more clearly out of anger at the world and not at Chris. "She was so young. And new to the streets. I'd just started seeing her around Night Moves a few weeks ago. I hadn't had much of a chance to talk to her, but she seemed sweet, you know? Just… just… she just needed a little direction… a little more prodding and I think she would have been willing to give social services a try." Rita turned away from the water, looking back at the parking lot. Surveying the scene of gawking on-lookers and crime scene processors. Trying not to look at the mutilated girl who'd been discovered under the pier; the girl she knew only as Chloe.

Night Moves was the teen runaway center Rita volunteered at a few nights a week, her day job permitting. She had a cop's knack for keeping her cool and her emotional distance when the teens lashed out, but she also had a big heart and the eternal optimist's belief that she could reach most of them with enough time and effort. As Chris often said of her, she was a sucker for strays. She'd spent a little time in the care of social services herself as a child, after her parents had died. She knew what it felt like to be at the mercy of bureaucratic forces and grief too big for a child to bear. But she also knew the good that could come when caring people worked in the system. After all, she was a success story. She'd ended up with the Lances as her foster family, and she'd come out the other side of trauma stronger for it.

Now here she was, bearing witness to Chloe's pain. Chloe was the third young woman in six weeks to show up sexually assaulted, mutilated, and tossed on the beach like yesterday's trash. Rita had known the first girl as well. She and Chris had responded to the call about a "DB" on Riviera Beach just two days after Rita had gotten the girl—Jenn—a referral to a half-way house… a referral Rita would soon enough learn Jenn had never followed through on.

Here at this latest crime scene, at a beach north of Pinewood Park, the forensics team had gotten all the photos they needed with the scene as it had been found by the witnesses who'd called it in, and the Medical Examiner had taken her preliminary notes. They had Chloe in a bag and on a stretcher now, wheeling her to the ambulance that would take her back to the station so Keisha could complete her examination of the body there. As she walked by Chris and Rita, Keisha stopped to console her friend. "We'll get this bastard, Rita." She squeezed her arm. "I'll let you know the second my report is ready."

"Thanks, Keisha," Chris and Rita said in unison.

As Keisha and her team left the scene, Chris turned his attentions back to his partner. He knew Rita was strong and could handle pretty much anything. But that didn't mean she didn't feel things deeply. And sometimes she got a little too emotionally invested in a case. How could she not? They all did on occasion. So he worried about her. They hadn't had much luck on this one so far, with the few leads they'd caught early leading them only down dead ends. Their nerves were frayed.

"Look, Sam," he said matter-of-factly, grabbing her by the shoulders and turning her toward him, "the uniforms are canvassing the remaining witnesses. You and I have talked to the guys who found Chloe. We've done what we can do here. Let's head back to the shop and talk to Cap. He's been driving me crazy anyway, calling me every five minutes asking for updates. Let's get away from this mess and start working Chloe's case. Ok?" He wanted to get Rita into detective mode to allow her to distance herself a bit from the brutality of the morning so far. Working and feeling like she was doing something useful would help her process the pain.

"Ok, Sam," Rita sighed as she started walking to the car. She appreciated Chris's concern for her, but she was too raw to show it. She had to keep her armor up. She reached the car quickly, let herself into the passenger side of their standard issue Ford interceptor sedan, and waited impatiently for Chris to get them back to the station.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2:**

They had been in Captain Lipschitz's office for less than two minutes when the phone rang.

"What?!" he barked into the receiver. He was standing behind the desk, one hand on the phone, the other holding his lower back. The lower back is a delicate meeting point of twitchy nerves and overused muscles. His ached. And smelled. Frannie, his retired-too-soon nurse of a wife, had concocted some god-awful herbal potion for his sore muscles. She insisted on three applications a day for a week. She could up it to ten a day for all the good it was doing. Not that he had any intention of telling her how ineffectual her labours had been. Better to smell like the inside of a hippie's camper van than risk the wrath of his beloved, but overly-sensitive, wife. He'd already run out of "I'm sorry" gift ideas for the month, and he liked to eat.

"Send her in," he snapped at the receiver. Before he could even finish hanging up, he was looking sternly at his two favourite homicide detectives. Pointing at them both he said levelly, "You are getting some company on this case. You are going to behave yourselves and play nice. This is not a punishment, and it's not a request."

"No way, Cap…" Chris was immediately defensive.

"This is b.s., Cap…" Rita was yelling at the same time.

"uh uh uh…" Captain Lipschitz said quietly, holding his palm toward them while shaking his head. Once they had stopped protesting (at least verbally), he closed his eyes slowly, counted to three, then opened them and shook his finger. Softly he reprimanded them: "Did you hear the part about how this is not a request? You will speak politely. And quietly. There will be no yelling." He stopped and looked over his glasses at them until they had stopped pacing back and forth.

"Cap…" Chris started again.

"Shhh, Lorenzo." Lipschitz's voice was barely more than a whisper. "I know you don't want help on this case. But sometimes, we get the help we don't even know we need." He shrugged. "A fresh pair of eyes. A new perspective. Maybe we break this case sooner. In the end, we all want the same thing." He smiled insincerely at them. And as he was saying this, the door opened, and in walked one of the most beautiful women Chris had ever seen. Not pretty like the kids waiting tables here. Not sexy like the girls on the beach. Not "beautiful" like the rich women who made it a full-time job to tan, wax, primp, and botox their way to some version of plastic perfection. Just a confidently, naturally, classically beautiful woman. (Kind of like Rita, if he let himself think about it. Which he tried not to do too often.) Five foot seven once she was out of those low-heeled ankle boots, he guessed. Blue eyes, reddish-brown wavy hair falling a little past her shoulders. Well-cut suit. A Fed, he guessed. Had to be with that wardrobe budget. His anger was giving way to intrigue.

"That's right," the mystery woman said in her all-business alto. "We all want the same thing. To catch this son-of-a-bitch before he has the chance to hurt anyone else." She surveyed Chris and Rita in a detached, but not unfriendly, way. Before the Captain could make the introductions, she stuck out her hand to Rita. "Devon White," she introduced herself. Name only. Not pulling rank. Rita appraised the newcomer, her clenched jaw working overtime. After a moment she seemed to make up her mind to follow orders and play nice. " _Sergeant_ Rita Lance," she said taking Devon's hand and shaking it firmly, then dropping it quickly. Devon nodded and turned to Chris, offering her hand to him as well. "Chris Lorenzo," he said without missing a beat. He was still irritated, but also interested. And she had a firm handshake. He liked that in a woman. Devon nodded again. Chris may have let a flirty smile start to creep up the corners of his mouth. But he'd deny it.

"Special Agent White is here from the FBI's Miami office," Captain Lipshitz decided to move this along and take control before any pissing matches could break out. "The sadistic and ritualistic nature of this case has caught the attention of the Feds, and she will be working closely with you. You will keep her apprised of **all** leads. You will work **with** her as you would any detective from this office." The Lip didn't like to leave any room for misunderstanding, and he kept his gaze firmly locked on Chris and Rita. "You are a team of three on this case, starting now."

Turning to Devon, he said. "But to be clear, Agent White, these officers have been busting their butts night and day on this, and they are the best cops we have in Palm Beach. This is their investigation and you are a guest in our house. A welcome guest, but a guest nonetheless."

Devon's lip curled in barely suppressed bemusement, but she stayed quiet.

"Now," Lipschtiz smiled and spread his hands wide, "can't we all just get along?"

Rita was still riled up. "Fine, Captain. You say we have to play nice. Fine. But," she said archly, turning to Devon, "we're the leads on this case." Chris noticed her nose was flaring. Not a good sign. He put a hand lightly on her arm, a gentle warning to stay on the Lip's good side and to give the nice Federal Agent a chance. She shrugged it off. She was in no mood to be placated.

"We all want the same thing, Sergeant Lance," Devon said evenly, meeting Rita's eyes. "You two want to catch this psycho, and so do I. From what I've read of the case file, these murders are similar to a couple of unsolved Miami homicides from a few months ago. I want to hear more to see if we still think there's a connection. But whether there is or isn't, we've got to get your guy off the street. Yes, it's your case. Yes, I'm an outsider and you're not happy about it. You think I'm going to pull rank because I'm a Fed. I'm not…. Unless you give me a reason to." She paused to let her words sink in. "We don't have to be at odds." She was looking back and forth between Chris and Rita now. "I want us to work _together_ on this. I'm not interested in a turf war. I'm interested in catching this bastard."

"Great!" Captain Lipschitz chimed in with false glee. "We're all friends here. So… Chris, Rita… tell us what you've got. You can brief me and get Agent White up to speed at the same time."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3:**

They sat in Lipschitz's office for a good half an hour, with Chris and Rita filling the Cap in on the latest murder and answering Devon's occasional request for a little more background. She knew she'd have the chance to ask more questions later, but she also wanted to start from as clear a picture as she could. That said, whenever possible, she preferred listening to talking. She believed you could often learn more by sitting back and letting people follow their own thoughts rather than trying to direct them. Her observational skills had played a significant role in her quick rise up the FBI's special investigations ranks.

Rita started the briefing. She needed to work it through out loud, anyway, to process some of the chaos whirling through her head. "Chloe's body was discovered just before 9 this morning by a couple of local workmen who'd been hired to do some repairs on the pier at the north end of Pinewood Park beach." Rita glanced down at her field notes tablet, possibly hoping something more useful would magically appear there. "They went down to check the integrity of the pylons and found her crumpled beside a support post in the middle section of the pier. They called 9-1-1 as soon as they checked to see that she wasn't breathing. There were a few other people out on the beach… the early morning surfing and running crowds, but no one was particularly close to the pier. Uniforms are still canvassing, but so far, it sounds like there were no earlier 9-1-1 calls because no one there saw her until our friends the handymen showed up."

"And you're checking into their story?" Lipschitz asked the question to which he already knew the answer.

"Talked to the pier's owner; their story checks out. Just a bad luck morning for them, finding a dead girl when all they wanted was a cigarette and slow work day." This was Chris, giving Rita a chance to collect herself again. "We'll keep running background on them, but they seemed pretty shaken up." Chris paused and glanced over at Rita before continuing. "Chloe was in the same condition as our first two victims: heavy bruising over most of her body; clothes ripped; lots of wounds… I'm guessing from the same knife as the other two girls. Keisha's doing the work-up now; she should be able to give us the details in a few hours."

Devon was looking at Rita, who was being the consummate professional, but was also clearly working hard to keep it together. "How do you know her name was Chloe?" she asked softly.

When Rita didn't respond right away, Chris chimed in: "She showed up a few weeks ago at the teen drop-in centre where Rita volunteers…"

"Night Moves." Rita interrupted him. "We try to connect runaways with social services, or at least a motel and hot meal. Try to help them get off the street, get them counseling. Whatever we can." She'd lost some of the fight in her voice. Devon wasn't doing the usual officious F.B.I. dance; she actually seemed concerned about the case and not just about the glory of getting her name in the paper.

"So you knew her then?"

"A little." Rita's voice caught, but she quickly continued as though nothing had happened. "She was a sweet kid. I thought she was persuadable. She clearly didn't want to go home, but she seemed like she might be willing to think about counseling and finishing a G.E.D. course so she could find work off the street."

"I'm sorry," Devon said simply, and then waited for them to continue updating the Captain. Rita nodded, grateful for both the sincerity of the sentiment and its brevity.

Chris and Rita took turns answering the Captain's questions and confirming the preliminary similarities between this case and the first two. It was getting harder to avoid the realization that they were facing a potential serial killer, which might make the resources of the FBI somewhat useful, though they weren't prepared to admit this out loud just yet. And this being Palm Beach, the rich and wanna-be famous were clamoring for the police to "hurry up and do their jobs." If they didn't catch a break soon, someone was going to have to get fired just to keep the wealthy appeased. And, of course, the mayor would probably call another press conference to take them to task for failing to keep the streets safe—and failing to allow him to take credit for restoring "law and order" to this over-privileged town. It was enough to give Lipschitz indigestion. As the briefing wore on, he reached into his top desk drawer for some antacids. Before he could pry one loose of its foil wrapper, the phone rang again.

"Lipschitz" he barked into the receiver and almost immediately rolled his eyes. Covering the mouthpiece with one hand he said to the three detectives in his office, "It's Donovan. Calling on behalf of the _mayor_." Harry dragged out the word like a petulant boy in the school yard. "You three, go. Work this case." He waved his hand toward his office door, shooing them out. They rose quickly to give the Captain his office back.

Into the phone he whined, "Donovan, please. Do I look like a miracle worker? My detectives are working triple time on this…" They lost the end of the sentence as they closed the door behind them. They stood outside his office, looking at each other a bit warily. Chris broke the silence before it could build any real tension. "I'll get you a chair," he said to Devon, " and you can join us at our desks." He gestured vaguely to the two nearest the Captain's office, arranged so they were facing each other. "You can help us wade through these witness statements until Keisha has something for us."

Once they were seated, Chris and Rita filled Devon in on the background she hadn't already gotten from the briefing. All three girls had been runaways in their late teens. They'd been living mostly with their informal "street families," sleeping under piers and highway overpasses, occasionally in a flea bag motel if the group could scrounge enough money together. As best they could figure from the little information the girls' friends would give the cops, the young women weren't regularly turning tricks, but might on occasion if desperate for money, or if it meant a slightly cleaner and less crowded room for the night.

"So we can't rule out a bad john or someone who gets his kicks from hurting prostitutes," Devon interrupted.

"No, and we haven't. But we also haven't gotten any strong leads on that front," Chris replied.

"We haven't gotten any strong leads at all," Rita muttered, tossing a file folder so hard it knocked half the contents of her desk top onto the floor.

"I got it," Chris jumped up to gather the mess. As he put the pens and papers back on Rita's desk, he lingered a few minutes to give her a quick shoulder rub. Devon observed the easy intimacy they shared, but said nothing.

As Chris was returning to his desk, Keisha strode through the palm tree cutout doors to the squad room and made a bee-line for the three detectives. "We got a serial psycho on our hands" she announced.

"You're sure?" Devon asked.

"I'd bet a year's salary on it. All three girls…they had massive contusions in similar patterns over most of their bodies."

"What do you think caused them?" Chris queried.

"My best guess? Brass knuckles. Look here." She pulled out three photos, one of each victim, and laid them on Rita's desk. Chris and Devon stood on either side of her to look at the evidence as well. "The bruises are of similar depth and width.. And if you look at these…" she paused to point out a few distinctive bruises on each girl, "what do you notice?"

"All three of them have contusions on their sides with the same odd, three-prong marking," Devon said almost immediately. And then she got excited. "Which means it might be the same deformity—let's call it his 'calling card'—because our guy apparently has brass knuckles with spikes, but one spike is worn down or broken." She was smiling now. A clue. What a beautiful thing.

"Yes," Keisha said, nodding quickly. "It's subtle, and harder to see on our girl from this morning because the bruises aren't as old as they were on the second girl, but I think that's what we're looking for."

Rita nodded appreciatively, as Chris said "Nice work, K. You're the best."

"You know it."

"What about the knife," Rita asked.

"That's the same, too, best I can tell."

"Any guesses on what kind of knife we're looking for?" Devon asked. She had her own information on the two Miami victims, but they hadn't gotten around to talking about those girls yet. She was curious, though, to see how much overlap there was.

"My best guess is a small Bowie knife, maybe a 7 and a half or 8 inch blade. It has a bit of a curve on the tip."

"What's your ETA on the time of death?" Rita was back to thinking about her last conversation with the young blonde woman she hadn't been able to help.

"Based on liver temperature and rigor, sometime between one and two a.m."

"Seven hours," Rita said softly. When Chris looked quizzically at her, she explained, "She was on that beach for seven hours before anyone found her."

"Or a little less, maybe." Keisha added. "I do have one more piece of good news for you."

"Keisha, you've been holding out on us? Bad girl!" Chris just couldn't help himself. He flirted with women. Especially Keisha. It helped cut the tension. And she was good at it.

"Saving the best for last is my gift to you, Chris." Keisha winked at him. "We found three fibers under her fingernails. The lab is analyzing them now. So she was killed somewhere else, I think, and then dumped. Maybe not right away."

"Fibers. Our guy is getting lazy," Chris whistled happily.

"Or cocky," Devon chimed in sourly.

"We haven't seen fibers on our previous victims. Could be a break! I'll let you know what we find out," Keisha said as she gathered her photos back into the file folder and playfully slapped Chris's arm with it as she turned and left them to work their cop magic with their new intel.

As Chris and Devon sat back down, Rita asked, "so how does this fit with your Miami cases?"

"Too well," Devon said. While she'd be happy if they could solve those earlier murders by solving the Palm Beach cases, the thought of a serial killer on the loose didn't exactly fill her with joy. "Our M.E. didn't say anything about the unique brass knuckle pattern in the bruising, but it was subtle. I'm going to ask him to take another look." Chris and Rita were nodding, pleased that Keisha had found something the Feds had missed. "And the knife pattern fits what we found on the first two girls. At this point, I'd say there's a better than 70% chance that it's the same guy." Rita nodded in agreement.

"Or woman," Chris said with a tip of his head and knowing glance toward the two women in front of him. "Let's not be sexist in our assumptions." The two women just looked at him silently for a long few seconds. "Yeah, you're right" he finally conceded. "Probably a guy."

"Probably a white man, early-30s to early-40s. Maybe as young as late-20s, but I doubt it," Devon specified. She wasn't technically a "profiler," but knowing basic criminal psychology went a long way toward working up a suspect sketch. "Could be Hispanic, given that one of the girls in Miami was Mexican and your second girl was Latina." Chris and Rita had located the girl's family a few days ago, up near Pensacola: white dad, Columbian mother, three younger sisters. The family wasn't wealthy, but there was also no obvious reason for their daughter to have run away. They were strict, they admitted, but only because Mirabella had started breaking curfew and hanging around with a bad crowd. They had worried about her and tried to set her straight by tightening the reins and imposing more rules and restrictions. She rebelled, and then she left with her loser boyfriend of the week. That had been five months ago, and they hadn't heard from her since.

"Great. A 29-to-45 year-old white or Hispanic male in Palm Beach. That narrows it down." Rita's frustration flared again.

"Sammy, it's a start. We'll get him," Chris willed her to focus, and to trust in their skills, their teamwork.

"Uh, 'Sammy'?" Devon couldn't help herself from asking.

"Slammin' Sammy Snead" they sang in unison, and explained the origin story of their preferred term of endearment. This time Devon smiled at their intimacy, but still said nothing.

They turned back to reviewing witness statements for anything they may have missed. Having Devon there to bounce the statements off of provided some welcome new eyes and ears and a couple of fresh ideas they would need to follow up on. But after three hours of detailed working through the five crime scenes they were now treating as one case, they hadn't made much in the way of significant new headway.

"Listen guys," Devon finally said. "It's nearly 3.30. We've been at this for hours and we're talking in circles. Also, I'm starving. I need food. Now."

"Hah!" Chris exclaimed. "Get a load of this, Sammy. The Federal Agent can't work through a little hunger." He was teasing Devon, who just rolled her eyes.

Rita just smiled lightly. She was still wary of the agent, but warming fairly rapidly. Devon was working hard, not taking shortcuts. Thinking things through and being respectful of her and Chris's work and ideas. It was a nice change from the usual dismissive and bullying approach too many of her FBI colleagues took when they deigned to darken the door of the PBPD.

"We've got a taco truck with your name on it," Rita offered to Devon by way of a peace gesture after their rocky start this morning.

"Perfect," Devon said. "So long as there's lots of grease, and some coffee better than this," she said, grimacing at the hours-old sludge at the bottom of her mug.

"If it's grease you want, you've come to the right place" Chris assured her as they all rose to leave for their hard-earned, and very late, lunch.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4:**

They took the opportunity of the lunch break to chat about something other than the case, both because they all knew that thinking about something else was one of the best ways to let the brain process information and maybe put it together creatively, and because they were getting burnt out on the hideous details of this one. Even seasoned cops have their emotional limits. That said, it was still definitely "first date" territory, and they stuck to work-related topics. Devon asked how long they'd been partnered—"Five years!" Chris smiled widely and looked at Rita, who gave him a loving grin and that endearing tilt of her head she saved for him. "Five mostly wonderful years," she teased.

"What do you mean 'mostly'?!" he asked with false indignation.

"Well, the first few were a little rocky until you learned how to follow the rules."

"Which rules?" Now he was confused.

"MY rules," Rita said playfully. Chris put his hands together in prayer position and bowed his head in mock deference. But what he said was, "Oh, but I'm sneaking up on you, Sammy. Secretly, I'm training you."

Rita just snorted and popped a French fry into her mouth.

Devon saw the way they looked at each other, noted again their easy intimacy and the genuine affection that could dip into flirtatiousness, and wondered what else they shared. She was a cop, too. She knew the kind of closeness that was necessary for a strong partnership to develop and sustain itself, that it could be more emotionally intimate than a marriage in many ways and never cross the line into a sexual relationship. But she also knew some partners did cross the line, none of them successfully, at least not that she knew about. They either married and split up the working relationship, or fell apart between the sheets and on the job, too. So Devon guessed that Chris and Rita hadn't become lovers, at least not yet, but she couldn't be sure. Maybe a one-night fling that had been enough to scratch the itch? It was possible, but also none of her business, really. Certainly she was in no position to ask them here and now.

"What about you?" Chris turned to Devon. "Do you always fly solo?"

"Not always." She ran her hand through her hair and looked into the distance beyond Chris as she thought about how to answer the question. Briefly, she decided.

"Mostly I work with a small team. There are six of us, and we usually work on interstate kidnapping and murder investigations. Sometimes we get called in on hate crimes or other bad behaviours by the religiously fanatic or anti-government types. But occasionally we head out in pairs or 'fly solo' as you say. Depends on what the case we're consulting on calls for and what the rest of our case load looks like."

All of this was true. She just didn't bother to get into the fact that they had regular partners they were paired with when they were out in the field, and her most recent partnership had gone fantastically sour after **they** had crossed the line a few times. They'd actually done pretty well at keeping the boundaries clear—at work, they were all-professional all the time—and they'd been good together. No weird jealousies. No inappropriate possessiveness. It had all been really good for a few months. Then his almost-ex-wife came back in town and decided she didn't want to be his ex anymore. They'd been split for 11 months, and in just one more, the divorce would have been final. But Janet changed her mind. And Doug—that loyal sap—decided he owed it to the woman who was technically still his wife to try to make it work. Devon knew she had a knack for picking men with commitment issues. She just wasn't used to those commitment issues being so focused on the **maintaining** of commitment rather than the avoiding of it.

Chris noticed a slight hesitation in her answer, but decided not to pursue it. At least not here. Possibly over drinks in a day or two? "I mean, if we're going to be partners," he thought to himself, "we ought to learn a little more about each other, right?"

After a few more minutes of pleasantries, they took a break before resuming work on tracking down their killer. Devon called in to the Miami office to update her superiors and offer a few thoughts on their on-going investigations there. Chris and Rita scrolled through emails on their iPhones, happy to be working silently together.

Eventually, the three of them headed out to interview a few more witnesses the uniformed officers had flagged from the morning's canvassing, and they revisited a couple of informants from the previous cases. They didn't learn much, but it gave Devon a chance to see how Chris and Rita worked an interview, and vice versa. Mostly, though, Devon honored Rita's earlier demand in the Captain's office, and she let them take the lead. They called it a night at 7:00 p.m. and split up to get some dinner and rest. Devon had to get settled into her apartment hotel, and Chris and Rita had a previous date to keep: _Casablanca_ was playing on cable. They were committed to two hours on Rita's couch.

…

The next day was "shoe leather" work: going back over crime scenes and making phone calls. Chris and Rita also had to do a little paperwork catch-up on some recently-cleared cases, and Devon settled into her temporary desk in a cordoned off area to the side of the squad room. It was a standard-issue, Dilbert-style office cubicle, but it still offered her more privacy than anyone else in the squad room had. Being a Fed clearly had a few privileges.

They had agreed to check in at the end of the day, but nothing much had come of their efforts, and they ended up fairly frustrated by quitting time. Chris headed off a few minutes early to coach a local boys' basketball team and then see if he could persuade Misty, a woman he'd had a few promising dates with, to stay in for "dinner." That left Rita and Devon alone in the squad room.

"So," Rita said, "wanna grab a pizza? Sal's isn't too far from here, and they have the best pizza in town." Rita wasn't the kind of woman who got competitive with other women. She had a number of strong friendships with both women and men, and she was confident enough in her own beauty and brains that she wasn't troubled by insecurity around others who were also attractive and smart, nor was she prone to the petty possessiveness over friends or lovers that she had observed in too many of her species. Plus, she was starting to like Devon, and heading back to her empty apartment right now sounded really unappealing. Usually she could maintain the emotional distance from her work that was necessary for a homicide cop to stay sane and good at her job. This case, though… this one had gotten under her skin and seemed determined to settle in. It was personal.

"That sounds perfect," Devon smiled. She liked working with both Chris and Rita, but it would be nice to get a little female-bonding time in, too.

…..

"So I've seen Chris on his best behaviour" Devon was saying as they settled into the booth at Sal's, starting on beers while waiting for the pizza to arrive, "but what's he really like?"

"He's exactly what you see," Rita said a bit proudly. "I mean, he can have his cave-man moments, but I've coached most of those out of him." Both women laughed. "He's thoughtful and smart. He's sensitive…."

"And easy on the eyes," Devon interrupted.

Rita laughed and raised an eyebrow. "Yep, yes, he is very good looking." She paused. "Are you, um, _interested_ in my partner?" It was a friendly inquiry.

"Oh, no, no. Nothing like that. It's just hard not to notice, you know?"

"Yeah, I know. And I think he knows, too, given how frequently women hit on him. But luckily he doesn't let it go to his head. Too much."

The conversation was easy and going well. And they each had a good half a mug of beer in them with no food in sight yet, so Devon asked the question she hadn't felt comfortable raising the other day. "So… have you two ever… you know" she shrugged a bit and looked meaningfully at Rita, waiting for the younger woman to catch her drift.

"Have we ever slept together?" Rita tossed off easily. It wasn't like she hadn't gotten the question before. And she didn't mind. The inquiry was clearly motivated by genuine curiosity and a friendly getting-to-know-you spirit more than gossipy prying. "No, we've never crossed that particular line."

"Why not, if you don't mind me asking. And if you do, just tell me to shut up!" They both laughed and held up their empty mugs toward the waiter in the universal signal for "more beer!" Two new mugs quickly materialized, along with their pizza.

"No, I don't mind. Chris and I… we're more than work partners; we're best friends, you know? Complete each others' sentences, can call each other at 3 in the morning, would literally take a bullet for each other best friends. I love him. And he loves me. But we're not _in love_ , if that makes sense."

"Yeah, it does." Devon paused. The beer was making her loose, loose enough to press the point, anyway. "But sometimes people say that as a way of avoiding an entanglement they're afraid of, afraid it would mean a kind of emotional vulnerability they don't want to risk. I mean, surely you've thought about it?"

Rita was getting pretty relaxed as well. "Yeah, if I'm being honest, I have thought about it on occasion. But never very seriously. If I'm afraid of anything, it's not about commitment to him, it's about screwing up the best relationship in my life! We have the perfect relationship. Why risk messing it up with sex!"

At that, they both laughed again. "I hear you," Devon said. "That does make sense. And I'm sorry to push." And she did believe Rita. Having watched Chris and Rita together this week, it was clear that they had a deep, abiding connection. She'd never been one of those people who thought men and women couldn't be "just friends." Hell, some of _her_ best friends were guys. But it did mean other people were always curious. Especially if you set off sparks the way Rita and Chris did sometimes.

"So, if not Chris, is there some other man in your life?"

"Just Alfred," Rita paused, "my goldfish." This got another laugh from Devon as Rita went on. "I've had a few serious relationships, and some fun flings, too, but… the job, you know?"

"Believe me, "I know," Devon commiserated. At Rita's questioning ("Turn about is fair play!" Rita said), Devon ended up telling her the whole Doug saga.

"Oooh," Rita said. "That's a tough one. Married man…" Rita tried to keep the judgment out of her voice.

"He was separated!" Devon exclaimed. "He said he wanted nothing more to do with her. I mean, for Pete's sake, she had moved three states away to be closer to her parents. I thought he was safe!" Devon may have been a bit defensive. She wasn't a prude, but she also didn't think of herself as a home wrecker. In general, married men were out of bounds in her book.

"So are you two still partnered at work?"

"We're still on the same team—awkward!—but we managed to get the partnerships switched around. We convinced everyone that it was time for a rotation to keep things fresh and develop our field skills. I don't think anyone figured out the real reason. God I hope not!"

"Yikes. That's quite the cautionary tale! I'll remember that the next time I let my imagination get the better of me where Chris is concerned."

"He doesn't have a secret family holed up somewhere, does he?"

At this, Rita just snorted. "Yeah right. Like he could keep that kind of secret from me." Chris couldn't keep any secrets from Rita. Indeed, occasionally she wished he'd tell her a little _less_ about some of the more intimate details of his romantic affairs.

In addition to the Doug fiasco, Rita also learned that Devon hadn't always been a cop. She'd actually started out working in D.C. as a policy analyst. "Spending that much time around politicians made me want to do some good in the world" Devon said, mostly in jest. "After three years in Washington, I applied to the FBI and got accepted on the first round."

"Have you ever regretted it? Joining the force, I mean."

Devon thought about the question for a minute. "No" she said seriously. "I really haven't. Some days are hard…" Here Rita responded with a knowing nod. "Sometimes it's the bureaucracy, and sometimes it's just a case that wears you down. But I feel like I'm doing something important, you know? Actually contributing something… helping people."

Rita vigorously agreed. "Exactly. And I always wanted to be a cop. Well, at least since high school. When I was seven, I wanted to be a dolphin trainer at Sea World." This got a laugh from both of them, and a call for one—final—round of beers. They were clearly going to finish this whole pizza. They needed something to wash it down with.

Probably inevitably, their conversation turned to the trials—and benefits—of being a woman in a "man's job." Both agreed that there were double standards, and still far more sexism than there ought to be in this day and age, but neither one of them was a shrinking violet. "You have to let some of it just roll off and pick your battles," Rita was saying through the globs of melted cheese that was a signature of Sal's "the works" pizza.

"And be willing to see when the guys are just blowing off steam versus being actual jerks," Devon added.

They looked at each other. "And to tell them where to shove it when you have to," they said nearly in unison, laughing again and clinking their mugs together to emphasize the point.

They nursed their beer and nibbled on the remaining bits of pizza crust, chatting for close to another hour about movies and friends, hi-jinks they'd gotten into on slow work days and their hopes for families of their own in the future. As the evening was winding down, Devon asked Rita about her work at Night Moves.

"I have a volunteer shift there tomorrow night," Rita said. "You can come help out if you want. See what it's all about."

"I'd like that. Thanks." Devon was genuinely interested, but she also thought it'd be a good chance to meet some of the street kids and maybe catch a break on this damn case.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5:**

The next evening, Rita picked Devon up at her apartment hotel and drove them to Night Moves for a 9.00 p.m.-1.00 a.m. shift. Rita walked through the door with a renewed commitment to conveying the dangers of the streets to these kids. She introduced Devon to the other volunteers and explained the protocol for the night: answer the hotline; assess how much, if any, danger the caller was in; use the list of phone numbers and resources to try to get the kids shelter, food, medical care, or to come in for a talk. Whatever they seemed to need most. In addition to answering the phone, Rita told Devon she could help her talk to the kids who came through the drop-in centre. She didn't want to let Devon do one-on-one counseling since she hadn't been through the centre's training, but having some back-up in trying to get through to these kids couldn't hurt.

Near the middle of the shift, three girls Rita hadn't seen at the centre before came in together. They were full of false bravado, but Rita could see that they were worn out and a bit frightened. One girl in particular seemed more anxious and less street-hardened than the other two. She looked to be about 16, and scared. Rita tilted her head and gave the girl a small smile. It was a subtle invitation to fill the empty chair beside her desk. After hesitating for a few minutes—minutes that mostly seemed to involve getting teased by her "friends"—the girl made her way over to Rita.

"Hey," Rita said easily, engaging the girl like you might a frightened horse. "Have a seat. My name's Rita." Rita stuck out her hand.

The girl looked at it for a moment, and then offered a limp handshake in return. "I'm Lacey. And that's" she tossed her head back in the direction of her friends "Liz and Tina." Liz and Tina each offered a grunted "s'up?" in Rita's general direction but made no moves toward her. They seemed to have decided the coffee and food table was the place for them.

"What brings you in tonight, Lacey?"

"Just cold. And hungry. Real hungry." Her eyes were looking everywhere but at Rita.

"Well, you're welcome to the food we've got here, and I can give you a coupon for…" Rita was glancing through the slips of papers that were donations of services and coupons she had in an envelope on her desk… "McDonald's. It's a buy one, get one deal for an 'extra value meal.' It's not much, but it's yours if you want it."

"Thanks," Lacey said, taking the coupon Rita had pulled out of the pile. She sat there for a minute, seeming unsure what to do or say next, and Rita decided this was as close as she was going to get to an invitation to find out why Lacey was on the streets. As the girl started talking, Devon came and sat down beside them.

"We got kicked out of our apartment a few months ago. After my dad lost his job he took off, and my mum stopped paying the bills. When the landlord kicked us out, she said I could stay with her at her new boyfriend's place, but he's a creep." Lacey's voice trailed off.

"Are you still going to school?"

Lacey just rolled her eyes at the question.

"How are you making money?" This time it was Devon asking.

"I sell bootleg CDs and incense and stuff down by the piers. And… whatever."

Rita and Devon could guess at a few different things "whatever" might mean, but they decided not to push it.

"It's dangerous out there, you know." Rita wanted this girl off the street. She reminded her a bit of Chloe. "If I can get you into a half-way house, would you be willing to try that?" Rita tried to keep the question light, like it didn't matter to her. But it did.

"Halfway houses are for junkies and fucked up kids. I'm not fucked up. I can take care of myself. It's just been slow in the incense business," her tone managed to be both mocking and defensive.

"I'm sure you can take care of yourself, Lacey. But there are also a lot of people out on the streets who'd be happy to hurt you…"

Lacey interrupted Rita: "You mean like what happened to Jenn?"

Now Lacey had Rita and Devon's full attention.

"Did you know Jenn?" Rita asked in a tone she hoped sounded casual.

"Kind of. We weren't, like, friends or anything. But she and Tina," here she gestured toward the shorter and prettier of the two girls she had come in with, "had been tight for awhile. They had some kind of falling out right before Jenn disappeared."

"What did you hear about what happened to Jenn?" Devon asked, trying not to go into "special agent" mode.

"Just that she'd got in the car with the wrong guy and turned up raped and dead on the beach." Lacey said it like she was reading the weather report, but Rita and Devon could see the fear lurking in her eyes. She was looking at the two of them for some kind of confirmation, or maybe reassurance that it hadn't been as bad as all that.

"She got in a car?" Rita was also biting back her detective instincts, trying to sound conversational.

"That's what I heard."

"Who'd you hear that from?"

"Why? What's it matter to you?" Lacey was suddenly suspicious.

Rita's voice went up half an octave and a little more firmly than she intended she said "It matters because the creep who did this to her is still out there. And I don't want him to do anything like that to you or anyone else. So the more information we can find out about what happened to Jenn—and to Mirabella and to Chloe—the more we can tell girls like you who come here for help what to lookout for." That was true, but certainly not the whole truth of Rita's interest. At the mention of Chloe, Lacey's eyes went wide and she let out a small cry. "Chloe, too? Shit…"

"I'm sorry Lacey. Did you know her, too?"

Lacey just nodded.

"But you didn't know she'd been murdered?" Devon asked.

Lacey shook her head. "We'd had a fight a week ago, and she'd gone off to hang with some kids I don't like hanging out with."'

"And you hadn't talked to her or seen her since?"

Lacey gave her head another small shake.

"I'm sorry." Rita and Devon said, and gave the girl a minute to process the new information. Having heard Lacey cry out, Liz and Tina had started to edge closer to Rita's desk to try to eavesdrop on the conversation.

"So," Rita continued, a bit louder in case the other two decided they wanted to be useful "do you know anything about the car Jenn got into or the man she went off with?"

As Lacey was shrugging her shoulders, Tina piped up, "It was black. Shiny."

"You saw Jenn get into the car?" Rita was getting excited now. When they'd started working Jenn's case, they hadn't been able to locate anyone who'd seen her in the few hours before she disappeared. This was potentially a huge break.

"Yeah, I guess." Tina said, with no eagerness to be more helpful than absolutely necessary.

Devon took a deep breath to try to quell her impatience… "You guess?"

"I mean, I saw her get in a black car. The next day I hear she's dead. I don't know if she got into ANOTHER car after the black one. I'm just saying the last time I saw her, she was getting into a black car."

"What time was this? And where were you when she got into the car?" Rita's turn to ask questions.

"Somewhere on North Flagler, I think. I don't really remember. It might have been 10. Maybe 11."

"Did you tell anybody about this? Like the police? Or anyone?" Devon was fighting the urge to shake this girl. She couldn't tell if she was being deliberately vague, or if she was afraid of something. Or maybe she'd been high, and she really couldn't remember. And maybe that scared her, too, not knowing if the fact that she might have seen the guy meant that the guy had also seen her.

"I don't talk to cops. And I don't actually know anything. It was a black car. Shiny, like I said. Looked new. Fancy, like a Beamer or something. But I was halfway down the street when she took off with the guy. Like I said, it even coulda been another car, another guy."

"And you're sure it was a guy in the car?" Rita again.

"Yeah. He called out to her. Jenn was more willing to turn tricks than me. That shit gets you in trouble."

"What was his voice like? Old guy? Young guy?" Devon was grasping for anything now.

"He sounded like a guy. Like a guy who wanted to pay for sex with a girl." Tina was becoming increasingly petulant.

Devon and Rita decided they weren't going to get any more useful information out of her. They dedicated the next fifteen minutes to trying to impress upon the three young women how dangerous this "guy" was. By calling in every favor Rita had, they managed to get them into a shelter for two nights. And Rita wrote her mobile number on three slips of paper and handed one to each girl. "You hear anything, you remember anything, call me. Please. It's important. Day or night."

"What are you, a cop?" Liz finally decided to join the conversation.

Rita sidestepped the question. "I just want to help. I don't want any of you to end up like Jenn and Chloe."


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6:**

Rita tried to get excited about the new information, but Tina's inability to remember—or unwillingness to reveal—any specific details wasn't giving her much with which to buoy her spirits. In the squad room the next morning she, Chris, and Devon were updating the Cap.

'Okay, Rita," the Cap said, "let's review where we are. You said you got some new info at your teen centre last night."

"Yeah, Cap. For what it's worth. Our first girl, Jenn, had apparently split up from her friends and was walking down North Flagler on her own. But our guy approached her before she was completely out of her friend Tina's sight, so we might have a witness."

"And we're just hearing about this now why, exactly?" Lipschitz was incredulous.

"These kids don't trust cops, Cap," Chris offered, trying to buffer Rita from the Captain's irritation. "We couldn't track down Jenn's last steps, so we didn't know where she'd been picked up by the perp. If these kids aren't willing to come forward on their own, we can't always find them."

Lipschitz looked thoroughly unimpressed at this excuse. He stood, arms crossed, glaring over the top of his glasses at his detectives, waiting for them to hurry up and offer something more useful at this briefing. Devon sat off to the side trying to stay invisible, quite happy not to be a target of his exasperation.

Rita picked up where Harry had interrupted her. "Tina says Jenn got into a black car. She described it as 'fancy,' maybe a Beamer. But she couldn't be very specific. A man called out to Jenn—Tina thinks he was soliciting her—and she got into the car with him.

"So we're back to our theory that this guy is a 'bad trick,' or has some grudge against prostitutes, or girls he thinks are prostitutes," Harry surmised.

"Maybe, Cap," Chris said. "Or maybe he just likes hurting girls, and he lured her to the car by offering her a ride or a place to stay. The 'bad john' angle just doesn't feel right on this one."

"Well, Lorenzo, you're going to have to bring me something more than a _feeling_ if we're going to clear this case." Harry trusted Chris's instincts completely. But he was also getting impatient.

Chris winced, but he kept his mouth shut. He knew the Cap was frustrated. He was, too. He decided to let it slide. Rita didn't.

"That's not fair, Cap…."

Harry cut her off. "Look Rita, I trust his intuition. And yours. But we need more than a gut instinct to find this guy. We do still think that it's just one guy? Or has more new information come in that no one's bothered to share with little old me?"

Rita sighed. "Yeah. Tina mentioned one man. When we pressed her on it a bit later, she said she didn't see anyone else. Doesn't mean there wasn't…"

"…but serial killers usually work alone." Devon had decided now was the time to speak up.

Harry rolled his eyes heavenward. "For this, we need the FBI?"

The three detectives looked at each other, and seemed to come to some silent agreement that Harry's mood probably had as much to do with his still aching back—and having to spend every day smelling those awful herbs Frannie was still making him use—as it did with them and the case. They ignored the comment.

Chris cut to the chase. "One guy. Probably white, maybe Hispanic. Based on the angle of entry of the knife wounds, Keisha thinks he's about 6 foot, maybe 6'1. And he's cocky or excited enough to be getting sloppy."

As if on cue, a uniformed officer knocked on Lipshitz's door. Harry waved her in. "The M.E. just sent up this report; said to get it to Lance and Lorenzo right away."

"Thanks, Waterson," Chris said to the woman as he grabbed the file from her. He opened the report quickly as Officer Waterson turned and left them alone again.

A small smile cracked his lips as he started nodding his head. "Yes. All right. Now we're getting somewhere." His voice was rising with excitement. "The fibers Keisha pulled from Chloe match the carpeting used in late model BMWs and Audis. In fact they just started using it in the last two years." The tension in the room eased a bit, and the other three started to nod as well.

"Okay, good. That's good." Harry was trying to be encouraging while also rubbing his back.

"And we're getting a pattern," Devon decided to try again with the Captain. Based on the time of death, all of the girls seem to have been abducted at the beginning of a weekend. So maybe he's out of town during the week? Or maybe he's employed and this is how he lets off steam over the weekend. If he's driving a new BMW or Audi, he must have money somehow, unless the cars are stolen."

"We'll run it through property crimes, but let's assume for now the car's his" Harry said.

"Right," Devon was nodding. A stolen car would attract more attention than their perp would want, she guessed. "So the two girls in Miami were killed over the first and third weekend of one month. Then three months goes by, and nothing. Now he's back. And there are two weeks between Jenn's and Mirabella's murders, like before. But then only one week between Mirabella's and Chloe's. So why the speed-up? Is this—Lord help us—a new pattern? And what happened between Miami and Palm Beach?"

"And where's he going in between picking up the girls and dropping them after he's finished with them?" Chris asked.

Rita continued his train of thought without missing a beat. "Even if he picked Jenn up at the northernmost end of North Flagler Drive, that's still a good three miles from where she was found on Riviera Beach. Did he drive straight there? Or did he kill her somewhere else?"

"And Pinewood, where we found Chloe, is about half-way in between." Chris, still excited at the clues, finished Rita's thought for her.

While they were talking, they had gravitated toward a map of Palm Beach that Harry kept beside his desk. Lipshitz took a pencil and outlined a 3.5 square mile area. "Here," he said. "We go back and turn over every rock and blade of grass here. Talk to everyone. And then talk to them again. Anybody who's even thought about driving through this part of town, we talk to them." Harry was practically yelling now. But it was his excited yell, not the angry one. "Go. Go!" He shouted and shooed them out of his office.

As the three investigators were walking out the door, Harry grabbed his back with one hand. Bending over his desk, he reached with his free hand for the bottle of fresh herbal potion Frannie had cooked up this morning. He picked it up, looked at it for a few seconds and grimaced. After glancing furtively out his office windows to make sure the coast was clear, he dropped the bottle into the trash can and eased his way carefully into his chair.

…

Despite the initial excitement about their break in the case, canvassing a 3-plus square mile area was slow business. There are a lot of black Audis and BMWs in Palm Beach. People saw them all the time, and none really stood out to anybody. And they couldn't find any street kids—or anyone else for that matter—who remembered seeing Mirabella or Chloe getting into a black car. They kept at the interviewing and chased down the few tenuous leads they found, but after a few days of knocking on doors and talking to anyone who might have seen anything, they felt like they were back where they had started.

Near the end of the week, Devon and Chris met before work at a coffee shop just down the street from the station. Things were going well enough with Misty that Chris decided against inviting Devon to drinks or dinner, worrying that such an invitation might send the wrong impression to both Misty and Devon. That said, Chris did find Devon attractive, and he didn't mind the chance to spend some time just the two of them. But the main reason he'd asked her to breakfast was to chat about Rita. He was worried about her.

"These are the hardest cases for Rita," Chris said in between bites of donut. "She's as strong as they come, but cases with kids get under her armor."

"She's been laser-focused," Devon observed, touched again by the emotional care Chris and Rita doted on each other. "Do you think she's allowing herself to deal with her grief, or using work to avoid it? These particular kids weren't strangers to her."

"I hope she's dealing with it, but I know she's also using the job as a shield," Chris said, replaying in his mind his conversation with Rita last night. He'd showed up at her door with Chinese takeout in hand and insisted that they watch some _I Love Lucy_ reruns to lighten her mood. Before he left, they had talked about the case, of course, largely at Chris's insistence. Rita said she'd been having a few nightmares, but otherwise, she was fine. She just wanted to catch this monster.

Chris could read Rita better than anyone, and he knew she was putting on a brave face for him. But he also knew that when she did that, she needed space. She wasn't pushing him away, but there was only so far she could only let him see into her fears and anger, at least until she had worked through some of her feelings on her own. He'd done what he could: he'd made sure she was eating. He'd rubbed her feet. And he'd held her close for an extra long hug before kissing her forehead and sending her off to bed.

Now, before he could answer Devon's questions more thoroughly, he noticed Rita driving by the coffee shop on her way to the station. He and Devon grabbed their to-go cups and walked the long block to police headquarters to join Rita at work. It took Rita a few minutes to find parking, which meant they reached the front door of the station before she did.

For her part, as she walked from her car to the building, Rita saw the other two heading in together, chatting and carrying their coffees. She caught up with them and then let Devon get a few steps ahead, pulling Chris aside before he could enter the squad room after the federal agent.

"Breakfast date?" She asked playfully, bumping her shoulder against his arm.

"I guess you could call it that," Chris said, grinning widely.

"Anything I should know about, partner?" Rita took a step back, giving him an appraising look.

Chris has a number of different kinds of smiles. Rita has catalogued them all and can usually hone in on at least the general source of his glee based on the intensity of the grin and how much blushing and shoulder shrugging accompany it. On this particular occasion, he had just broken into the one so devilish that it makes his eyes dance. More often than not, this is the smile evoked by particularly happy times with a sexy woman.

"Well, Sam, there is one thing you should probably know. Yeah…" he said, not finishing the thought, but grinning even wider now, just looking at her, stepping closer to fill the gap between them that Rita had just created.

Rita's eyes went wide. Chris was clearly intimating that this "breakfast date" had started as a "dinner date" the previous evening. As she looked at the squad room doors, and then back at him, trying to decide whether to scold or congratulate him, he leaned his head toward hers conspiratorially and whispered, "I was ten minutes late to breakfast this morning." He paused, enjoying Rita's confused expression. "Things are going, uh, very well with Misty." He played with his collar and gave Rita the simultaneously coy and self-satisfied head tilt that accompanied any talk of his romantic conquests.

"Christopher Lorenzo!" Rita said it as his mother might have when scolding him for taking too many cookies from the cookie jar. And then she smacked him on the arm for good measure. Chris just laughed. "What Sammy? Wait. You thought.. me" he points to his chest, "and her," he points to the squad room. "No." There was that grin again. "I mean, she's, um, she's"

"Your type?" Rita interjected helpfully.

"Well," Chris offered a shrug of false modesty, "I'd like to think so." At this Rita just rolled her eyes at him. "But I'm a one woman at a time kind of man, Sammy. And Misty…" he whistled and let the sentence trail off.

Rita shook her head and grabbed him by the arm, dragging him into the squad room.

An hour later, a call came over the scanner. A body had just been discovered near the public boat launch at South Lake Drive. It was a few miles south of the area they'd been canvassing. Still Chris, Rita, and Devon grabbed their coats and guns and took off running.

What they found when they arrived made it clear that their perp was in a new, more frequent, killing cycle, and didn't give a damn about the map they'd honed in on this week. There was Liz, Lacey's quieter friend from the other night, in a condition you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. This made four girls. In six weeks. And they clearly were no closer to understanding or catching him than they'd been when Devon arrived in town.

As they were interviewing by-standers and taking stock of every detail they could absorb, they heard a couple of kids cry out. Looking up, they saw Lacey and Tina and a few teens they didn't recognize standing next to the yellow crime scene tape with which the uniformed officers had cordoned off the area. Rita and Devon went over to talk to the girls while Chris and Keisha conferred over Liz's body.

When the two detectives confirmed for the girls that yes, it was Liz lying next to the pier, Lacey completely lost it. Rita put her arm around the girl and consoled her as she cried into Rita's shoulder. "It's going to be okay, Lacey," she sang softly, looking over the girl's head and meeting Chris's gaze. He'd looked over to her to make sure she didn't need him there yet. But Rita was a rock. She'd been the one close to losing it when they'd found Chloe, but here, taking care of Lacey and seeing yet one more murdered girl, a steely resolve took over. They were going to find him. This was going to end. She and Chris would make it happen. No one in their squad room was going to sleep until they found this bastard.

As Rita was comforting Lacey, Devon was talking to Tina. "So you are cops," Tina was saying, sounding betrayed.

"Yeah, we're cops. I'm FBI, and Rita is Palm Beach PD. What that means is we need you to talk to us so we can get this guy, Tina. Do you understand me?" Devon's tone was stone cold, and the look she gave Tina brokered no back talk.

"You could have told us the other night. You could try a little honesty," Tina was scared and trying to sound more confident than she felt. Two of her friends had been killed in the last two weeks, and she couldn't be sure the guy who did it hadn't seen her that night on North Flagler. She'd been high. It's why she and Chloe had fought. Chloe got mad at her whenever she smoked up. All Tina could remember was that that black car had been awfully flash; she didn't trust men who drove cars that nice but picked up girls from the street. They could afford high-rent escorts. Why were they slumming it? She'd learned it was usually for no good reason.

"The fact that we're cops wasn't important then. It's important now. So if you want to get high and mighty about honesty, why don't you start by telling us what else you know about Chloe. And Liz." Devon knew she should be gentler with the girl. Tina was young, and she'd just lost her friend. But she also thought Tina had made it clear that she only responded to bluntness. She was too street hardened to give in to people who tried to sweet talk her.

Rita pulled the two girls into the area inside the crime scene tape so they could talk away from the crowd that was gathering while Chris walked up to join them. Tina told them that she and Liz had gone off in search of food around 10 the previous night and were supposed to meet in front of a convenience store on Northwood Road at 11. Liz never showed.

"Was she alone when you left her, or did she go off with someone else?" Chris asked.

"She was alone."

"And no one saw her after that?"

"Not that I know of."

"Tina, if you hear anything from any of your friends, call us right away, okay? It's important. You still have my number?" Rita asked.

Tina just made a small nod. She wanted to say something bratty, but she had glanced over to where the M.E. was putting Liz in a body bag, and she just didn't have the energy.

Devon handed Tina and Lacey each a card. "And now you have my number, too. So no excuses." Underneath each business card Devon had placed four twenty dollar bills. "Stay off the streets," she said. "Call me if you hear anything, or need anything." Devon was trying to keep her voice even. Up until now, she and Chris have been bolstering up Rita. But Rita was holding it together like a champ. Today it was Devon who felt like she'd had all the air punched out of her.

Keisha's team was taking Liz away, and the uniforms had everything else under control. The three detectives turned to leave the scene, walking in silence for the full two minutes it took to get back to their car. Once there, Devon turned to the other two and said with an sharp edge in her voice, "Let's go to the range."

Chris and Rita looked at her a bit quizzically.

"I need to shoot something."

Chris and Rita just nodded.

The trio drove to the PBPD shooting range and spent the next 90 minutes unloading cartridge after cartridge into paper targets who had to stand in for the psycho they desperately wanted to put away. For good.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

After blowing off steam at the range, they'd grabbed some lunch to eat at Chris' and Rita's desks while they went back over their notes. They were trying to figure out the geography of the murders—had the perp suddenly expanded his territory and, if so, why? Or had they gotten it wrong all along? As they were running through scenarios, Rita's cell phone rang. She looked at the screen, but didn't recognize the number.

"This is Sergeant Lance," she said neutrally, answering the call on the third ring.

"Uh, is this Rita? From Night Moves?"

"Yes," Rita said quickly, her voice softening a bit. She recognized Tina's voice on the other end of the line.

"Uh, hey. This is Tina. You know, from this morning?" Rita couldn't tell if the girl was just nervous or really thought Rita would have forgotten her already. One of the many problems with so many of her cop colleagues calling street kids "throwaways" is that the kids themselves started to believe it was an accurate assessment of how memorable and important they were, or weren't.

"Yeah, Tina. What's going on. Everything okay?"

Hearing who it was on the other end of the phone, Chris and Devon fixed their gazes on Rita, hopeful Tina was calling with a clue and not to tell them someone else had gone missing.

"Uh, yeah. Fine, I guess. Yeah. I mean everything's fine…." Tina seemed uncharacteristically nervous. "So, um, I found someone who saw Liz after she and I split up last night. Our friend Switch? He um, he saw her walking near North Flagler and… and he saw her get into a car." Tina's voice was flat. Rita couldn't quite tell if she was high or just shutting down emotionally from all the stress from the loss of her friends.

"Tina, that's great. That's really good news." Rita flicked the cell phone up so that the earpiece stayed close to her ear, but the mouthpiece was at the top of her head, half buried in her hair. "Tina found a witness!" She said quietly but excitedly to Chris and Devon. They gave each other a near-silent high-five, and turned back to watch Rita talk to Tina. Rita swung the phone back down so Tina could hear her again as she spoke. "Where are you? Is Switch there with you now? We'll come meet you."

"No!" Tina jumped. "No. He won't be seen with you. Not after all this crazy shit that's gone down. He's not gonna risk being seen with any cops."

Rita was about to argue with the girl, but she could hear someone talking to her in the background. Tina responded, but the voices were muffled. Clearly Tina had put her hand over the mouthpiece so Rita couldn't make out what was being said. Based on the tone of their voices and the few words that weren't totally garbled, it sounded like Tina and whomever she was with were having some sort of mild disagreement. After a few seconds, Tina's voice came through the phone clearly again.

"He says he'll talk to you now. On the phone. But that's it."

"Okay. Good. Thanks, Tina. You did …" Rita's words trailed off as she heard a young man's voice closer to the mouthpiece. Tina had handed Switch the phone, not waiting to hear whatever Rita had to say to her. For her part, Rita grabbed a pen and note pad and Chris and Devon swarmed to either side of her to see the details as she took them down.

"Yeah?" A thin male voice drawled impatiently into Rita's earpiece. He didn't sound old enough to be out of middle school, but Rita assumed he was at least in his late teens if he was hanging out with Tina and her friends.

"You're Switch?" Rita asked.

"The one and only."

"And you saw Liz last night, and the car she got into?"

Switch sighed into the receiver, as though Rita were wasting his time. "Yep."

Rita gritted her teeth and counted silently to three. Keeping her tone bland she asked, "Can you tell me what time you saw her? And where she was when she got into the car?"

"We ran into each other outside the gas station near 8th Street, off North Flagler. It was… I dunno… 11, I guess. Maybe. Maybe 11:30."

"And is that where she got into the car?" Rita was trying to pin down any details this kid would commit to.

"No. We walked for a few minutes. She traded me some food she'd bought at the gas station for a cig. We walked over to Flager, up by the condos."

"So you were heading north?" Rita tried to sound conversational.

"Yeah I guess. Whatever. Liz was late meeting Tina. She was heading wherever they were supposed to meet."

"So did the car pull up to both of you?" Rita was being gentle, trying to keep the kid on her side, keep him feeding her information. Meanwhile, Chris was getting impatient. He was looking at her, making motions like he was casting a fishing rod, silently pleading with her to "hook" the info and reel this guy in. Lipschitz, who'd noticed their interest in Rita's call, had joined the group, and he put a strong hand on Chris's shoulder. Chris looked up and the Cap just shook his head, saying quietly, "patience, Lorenzo. Let the woman work."

Rita kept her full attention on Switch's voice on the other end of the line as he said, "Shit no. I wish it had…." His voice turned angry and he paused briefly, but he didn't make Rita beg him for details. Instead he continued, "I was heading back down to the library, near 2nd, to hook up with some friends. So Liz kept going up Flagler, after I turned back toward town. And I was walking, like, a block or two, and I heard a car slow down. I looked back at Liz… I don't know why, really… but I looked back and saw her leaned over, talking through the window… to the guy driving."

"Did you get a good look at the car? Or the guy?" While her eyes got wide with anticipation, Rita's voice stayed completely even. The resolve that had come over her at the beach this morning had her focused. She was excited, yes, but she knew they were still a long way from catching this guy.

"I walked part way back, just to see. But Liz was a smart girl; I thought she could take care of herself." Switch's tone had gone flat, like Tina's.

Rita waited.

"It was a blue car," Switch said, finally deciding to answer the question he'd been asked.

"Blue?" Rita was thrown.

"Yeah. Dark blue."

"You're sure it was blue, not black?" Rita didn't want to irritate the boy, but this was important.

"Yeah. Look, he was right under a streetlight. Dumb shit. So, yeah, I saw the car good. It was dark blue. BMW. 7 series maybe. Maybe a 5. H4B something…."

"H4B… wait, you mean you got a plate number?" Now Rita **was** excited.

Lipschitz threw his head back and both arms up in the air, turning 180 degrees, his back facing his detectives. Then he pivoted back around and smacked his forehead with the palm of his hand. If he lived to be a hundred, he would never get over witnesses who wasted time stringing you along with useless bits of information when they were sitting on gold. Panning for the gold was part of the art of the job, sure, but it didn't make it any less exasperating on a case this big.

"Yeah. Not all of it. I mean, I don't remember all of it, but that was the first part." Switch inhaled sharply; Rita guessed he was smoking. To her surprise, he kept talking. "At first she seemed nervous talking to him, but then, like, she seemed fine. Relaxed. Whatever he said, she got in the car. He didn't, like, force her or anything."

"Could you hear anything they were saying?"

"No. Like I said, I wasn't that close." Sullen teenage annoyance had taken over his voice again.

"Did you see him at all? Did he see you?"

At this, Switch paused. Unnerved perhaps by the possibility of having been spotted. "Looked like a white dude. Maybe. Maybe a Hispanic. He had slicked back hair anyway. That's what I remember. I don't know if he saw me… Listen. I don't know anything else. I gotta go."

Rita could hear the phone dropping away and Tina came back on the line. The girl ended the call quickly, but not before Rita impressed upon her the need to call her if Switch said or remembered anything else.

As she hung up the phone, all of the other detectives started talking at once. Finally Rita was able to silence them. "It was a blue car, not a black one. Maybe that's why Liz felt safe getting into it? I don't know what the guy said, but he must have convinced her that he wasn't our perp. But we got a partial plate…"

"Yeah, we heard. We're running it now." Chris was working furiously on his computer while the Cap and Devon stood somewhat helplessly at either side.

"Yes!" Chris half jumped out his seat. Cracking his neck and pointing at the screen in front of him he said, "we got you, you S.O.B." His eyes were twinkling with the adrenaline rush he got when he and Rita were hot on a case. "Check this out, Sammy. Carlos Ortega."

"Ortega?" Rita's eyes went wide again, in recognition of a big fish in their small pond.

Chris was nodding, still reading further down the records he'd pulled up. "That's right, Sam. Carlos Ortega, the no-good son of everyone's _least_ favourite State Senator: Thomas Whitman." Chris was shaking his head.

Lipschitz held his stomach. "Great," he muttered. "A politician's son." Indigestion was already settling in.

"Step-son, actually, Cap." Rita filled in some details. "If I remember the society pages correctly, Whitman married way up the social ladder when he married into the Ortega family. They're old Palm Beach money. Cuban originally; been here forever. His wife was a rich widow with a teen-age son, and old man Whitman got major sympathy points for taking the kid in even though he was kind of a wild child."

Chris was still reading the screen and his voice dripped with irritation. "Man, this guy is a piece of work. 28 years old now. He's been arrested for possession. Drunk and disorderly. Reckless driving. Battery. Says here one woman even accused him of sexual assault. Huh!" Chris snorted in disgust.

"And let me guess, Sam. All the charges have been dropped." Rita knew the routine. Whitman was one of the most powerful men in the state of Florida's political machine.

"Like a hot potato, Sam." Chris mimed the action as he looked up at his partner.

Donovan had come into the squad room, hoping for an update on the case. Chris, Rita, and Harry were giving him accusing looks.

"What?" he snapped. "Do I have food on my face or something?"

"We have a suspect, George." Rita filled him in on what they'd just learned. As she finished, all four of the cops were looking at Donovan, as if demanding some account of why Ortega was still on the street.

"Dammit. Why does it have to be Ortega? You guys," he was pointing at Chris and Rita, "need to handle this with kid gloves. You hear me?"

Harry was getting his back up, preparing to read George the riot act, but the Assistant District Attorney kept talking, trying to prevent Harry from interrupting him.

"I get it. Believe me. And I want this guy. I've got a file on him the size of which you wouldn't believe. But I can't make anything stick. Either mommy's money or daddy's connections get him off the hook before I can haul him into court." George was throwing **his** hands up in disgust now. "The last time you all picked him up," he pointed vaguely around the squad room, "we got _this close_ to nailing him. But the judge let him out without bail thanks to Whitman's influence, and good ol' Carlos skipped the country. Took a long trip back to the homeland to wait for things to cool down. Meanwhile, his mommy and step-daddy gave a cool million to Wrong-Way Conroy's re-election campaign, and suddenly, next thing I hear, we're not interested in pursuing the case." George snorted. Steam might as well have been coming out of his ears.

Chris turned to Devon, who was frantically scrolling through files on her iPad. "How does Miami fit into all of this?"

It was Donovan who answered. "I've heard rumors Ortega had upped his game. Moved into drug trafficking. He was splitting his time between here and there."

Devon was nodding, still rapidly scanning whatever files she'd pulled up. "That's what I've got to." She was shaking her head as she said with mocking understatement, "our friend Carlos has been a very bad boy. According to the reports the DEA has shared with us, they've been trying to build a case against him for facilitating a new coke pipeline they'd picked up intel about." She paused, scanning and scrolling. "Mmm. Mmm. Looks like they were getting pretty hot on his heels. Then nothing." She looked up, making eye contact with the crew around her. "That could account for the break. He kills the two young women in Miami. Then the DEA is getting close on the drug stuff. So he takes off or lays low for awhile. And then he comes to Palm Beach."

"For what, though?" Chris asked, thinking out loud. Working out the possible scenarios.

"Meet some buyers? Or try to drum up new business? Devon mused.

"If things were too hot in Miami, maybe he comes here to throw the DEA further off the scent," Harry was sounding more and more like the New York cop he had been for years. "Guy figures DEA's too stupid to track him an hour up the coast."

"That fits," Donovan said. "There were rumors Carlos had some drug connections here. Not small fry, either."

"Sounds like the DEA thought he looked good for brokering some deals between some Columbian suppliers and Miami importers," Devon filled in. "Maybe he then tries to double down and make the deal between the importers and the buyers here in Palm Beach as well. Cut out the middle man and double his money."

"Which has the added bonus of getting him out of Miami even longer, hoping the drug and murder trail there goes cold," Rita played out the end of the scenario.

"Well he's here now," Harry said slowly, looking meaningfully at Chris and Rita. "So let's find him before he slips the country again or God forbid kills another kid." His voice was rising to emphasize his seriousness. "Well what are you waiting for?" He looked at each of the detectives. "Find him!" With that, Harry grabbed at his now thoroughly inflamed stomach and turned toward his office, anxious for a Rolaid or three.

"If you arrest him," Donovan said severely to Chris and Rita, "make sure you have evidence that'll stick. I'm not losing my career over this." He turned and headed for the doors as Chris, somewhat helpless and annoyed, yelled at his back, "thanks for the support, George." Rita just shook her head. "Let it go, Chris."

They knew this was good, though. They could feel it. The pattern worked; it connected the dots. It put Carlos in the right place, and he was just the kind of stand up guy who would go in for murder. They still didn't have a motive for the particularly gruesome nature of the crimes, or why he was targeting kids, but it felt right.

From the records they had on Ortega, they were able to pull a last known address for one of his connections here in Palm Beach, a low level mob lackey with more ambition than brains by the name of Jack Vermosse. Vermosse was a former business partner of Donnie "Dogs" DeBarto who had fallen out of favor with DeBarto over Vermosse's handling—or mis-handling—of some black market electronics business in Palm Beach. Donnie ran a tight ship, and Vermosse was a no-class-having punk who'd made the mistake of insulting Donnie while trying to cheat him in a business deal. Because of this, Donnie may have let it slip to the lovely Rita—the cop for whom he had such a tender spot—that Carlos and Vermosse had chatted the last time Ortega was in town. This information may, or may not, have come at the cost of another dinner date with the genial mobster. Rita certainly wasn't going to confirm anything of the sort in front of Lipschitz, who also did his best not to ask too many questions to which he didn't want to know the answer.

With Donnie's information and the address they pulled, Chris and Devon took off in search of Ortega by way of Vermosse, while Rita went to find Tina to see if she or Switch recognized the photos of Orgeta and Vermosse they'd pulled from the computers. It was still possible Vermosse was their killer and not Ortega. She kind of hoped so, because the less-well-connected were easier to convict. But she'd soon enough learn they weren't going to get that lucky. Rita was just leaving the motel where Tina was more or less in hiding and drowning her fears in marijuana and cheap beer when her cell phone rang.

"Tell me you found him, Sammy," she said, having seen Chris' name on the screen.

Vermosse was last known to be living below his means in a bungalow near Lake Park, which is where Chris and Devon had just been. "No Vermosse or Ortega, Sammy. Not yet. But we did see Vermosse's ex-girlfriend. I gotta say… she didn't seem too unhappy about his being gone."

"Does she know where he is?" Rita asked hopefully.

"Not exactly. But she did say that Vermosse has been spending a _lot_ of time lately with"

"Oh let me guess, Sam," Rita broke in, "with Ortega?"

"Ding, ding, ding. Sammy, you're very good at this." Chris was smiling widely now. He and Rita were closing in. And any playfulness back in Rita's game made him a very happy man.

"Well let's hope we find Vermosse soon, with Ortega," Rita said. "I'm tired of him being three steps ahead of us."

"I hear you, Sammy. You get anywhere with Tina?"

"She can't be sure about either guy, but she thought Ortega looked a bit like the man she saw. And she certainly looked like she'd seen the devil when I showed her his picture."

"Well he is a handsome one. And we may be in luck. Vermosse's ex said Ortega was staying a friend's house, up near Juno Beach."

"Nice friends," Rita said. Juno Beach was one of the ritzier neighborhoods in town, which was saying something in Palm Beach.

"Well," Chris said in mock sympathy, "we wouldn't want the young man to have to suffer."

"No, Sammy. We wouldn't want that." Neither one could muster much sympathy for the rich and badly behaved. They didn't mind the rich per se, just the ones who thought that having money bought them out of the need to play by the rules. That is, most of them. "You have an address in Juno Beach or a name for these friends of Ortega?"

"We're working on it now. You want to meet us near the credit union off Route 1, in Juno Ridge, and we'll head up from there?"

"On my way, Sammy." Rita clicked off the call and jumped into her car. If traffic stayed light, she could be there in fifteen minutes. They were going to nail this bastard, and she wanted to be the first one through the door when they did.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8:**

When Rita pulled into the parking lot at the credit union, she found Chris and Devon leaning against the passenger side of their PBPD Ford Interceptor, heads bent over a shared iPad they seemed to be scanning for information. As the heat index was closing in on 100 degrees, Rita wasn't surprised to see them outside the car, jackets off, Chris's tie loose. Despite her focus on the case, Rita found herself noting somewhere in the back of her mind just how well Chris filled out his canary yellow, button-down shirt. This fact, and her noticing it, wasn't terribly surprising. She and Chris had always been friends with a clear appreciation of each other's considerable physical assets. What did surprise her was the slight twinge of something resembling possessiveness—possibly even jealousy?—that slipped through her as she observed Chris with Devon, heads almost touching, an easy rapport and only two inches, at most, between their bodies.

The sensation passed quickly as Devon and Chris both looked up at her eagerly as she jumped out of her car to join them.

Chris's eyes were dancing but his jaw was set; it was his fully focused "in the zone" look that pulled Rita in like a magnet. "We got an address, Sammy. Carlos has been staying in the 'winter mansion' that belongs to friends of the family." Chris couldn't help rolling his eyes at the extravagance.

Rita tilted her head and half-smiled. "A drug dealer with a house-sitting gig on the side. How sweet."

"Well, in this economy, it's good to diversify your skills," Chris mimicked the slick tones of a self-help guru as he winked at her.

Devon cut through the flirty banner. "And it's also good to network. The son of mommy's friend who owns the house is on the DEA watch-list. An up and comer, apparently. Juan Vargas. Making a name for himself up and down the East Coast. A real charmer."

Chris looked at Devon, then at Rita. Spreading his palms wide he asked, "Should we go see if Vermosse and Ortega are home?" in a tone that in other circumstances would suggest that they might opt to head out for pizza instead.

Rita tilted her head toward the two other detectives as she started to turn to her car, "Well, we're in the neighborhood. The least we can do is drop by."

They caravanned the short trip up to Juno Beach, no sirens, Rita leading the way. Chris called it into Cap who wanted to alert dispatch to send back-up, but Chris and Devon decided it would be too risky. If Carlos was home, they didn't want to chance anything tipping him off to their arrival. By the time Devon and Chris pulled into the driveway of the sprawling, gaudy, Pepto-Bismol pink Vargas mansion, Rita was already on her way to the front door. The other two rushed to catch up.

"Easy, Sammy. Let's do this smart."

"I want cuffs on this animal, Chris."

Devon was mostly listening, but also shaking her head as she scanned the exterior of the house. Chris looked at her to see if she'd spotted something important. What she'd spotted was something Chris had long ago stopped noticing. "Uh, interesting color choice… no accounting for taste, I guess."

"Hah! Money and taste rarely go hand in hand. Especially in this town." He took a quick second look at the paint job. Eh. Pretty standard for Palm Beach he decided.

Rita had knocked hard and loud, but hadn't given the usual "Palm Beach Police. Open up" warning because she didn't want anyone slipping out the back before they could have a chat.

A young blonde woman dressed only in a string bikini and see-through beach robe answered the door with all of the enthusiasm of a frat boy facing an physics midterm. As her eyes drifted over the three detectives in front of her, she leaned against the door frame, raised her eyebrows and managed to utter "yeah?"

"Sergeant Rita Lance, Palm Beach Police. Is Carlos Ortega here?" Rita flashed her badge.

"Nope."

"Has he been here at all today?"

Blondie shrugged.

As Rita was preparing to up the assertiveness of her questioning, they heard a man's voice coming from the back of the house. Rather than ask the helpful young lady whom it might be, they simply pushed past her and let themselves into the house, drawing their guns as they walked.

They crossed the living room with it's floor-to-ceiling windows providing an unobstructed view of the patio, pool, and gardens that made up the back side of the property, and Chris and Rita exited through the open sliding glass doors onto the concrete entertainment area poolside. Lounging decadently in a chaise was a man in his late twenties. But it wasn't Ortega. It was Vermosse, talking to a woman who appeared to be the maid, demanding more whisky.

He looked derisively over at the two cops, who were re-holstering their weapons.

"What the hell do you want?" he barked like someone much more important than he actually was.

"Jack Vermosse?" Chris clipped in his bad-cop voice, his eyes boring holes into Vermosse's face.

"Who wants to know?" Vermosse made clear just how unimpressed he was.

"Sergeants Lorenzo and Lance, Palm Beach Police. Your friend Carlos here?"

"Carlos who?" Vermosse sipped the last drops of whisky from the not-yet-refilled tumbler in his hand, not budging from the chaise.

"Carlos who?" Chris's voice rose. "Carlos Ortega. The guy you've been palling around with? Or suddenly you don't remember him?"

"Yeah, I know him. So what? That doesn't make me his babysitter."

Rita took a step closer to the chaise. "Well from what we hear, you and Carlos have been pretty chummy these days. Spending _lots_ of time together."

Vermosse just looked at her.

Rita stared him down.

"And?" Vermosse finally emitted, trying to sound bored.

"And so we figure you might know where he is." Rita spoke the words slowly to emphasize her contempt.

"Nope. Like I said, not my day to babysit him."

Chris decided to play along, if only because he didn't have a lot of other options. "So when **did** you last see him?"

"Haven't seen him in days."

"Really?" Rita's voice dripped sarcasm.

"Yeah. Really." Vermosse seemed to be enjoying getting a rise out of her.

"You haven't seen him in days, but you just happen to be staying at his friend's house?" Now it was Chris's turn to step closer to the sunbathing man.

Vermosse remained impassive. "Who, Juan? He's my friend, too."

Chris and Rita stood in silence, just looking at Vermosse.

"What, a man can't have friends?" Vermosse shrugged.

"Not someone as ugly as you," Chris goaded.

Before he could even finish the insult, Rita, losing patience, spat, "Where's Ortgea?"

"I told you. I. Don't. Know." Vermosse had dropped into a sing-song voice.

"Listen smartass…" Chris's voice was getting tight and he took another step closer to Vermosse.

At this, Vermosse sat up straight and got angry. "No, you listen. If you had a warrant, you'd have flashed it already. Which means you don't. Which means you need to leave. Now."

Instead of leaving, Rita shouted, "What about the girls, Vermosse?"

Vermosse was taken aback by the sudden change in the conversation. "What girls?" He seemed genuinely perplexed.

Rita flashed him a picture of Liz as they'd found her on the beach, holding it six inches from his nose.

"What the fuck?" Vermosse batted the picture away. "I don't know anything about any girls. And unless the next thing you pull out of your little bag of tricks there is a warrant, you're leaving. And I'm calling my lawyer," he added for good measure as he settled back into his lounge chair. He tried to reclaim his carefree posture, but he was clearly shaken.

Chris's nostrils flared. Legally, they were going to have to leave. And they were no closer to Ortega than before they got here. "We're watching you, Vermosse."

"Oh good, a stalker. I always wanted one." Vermosse put his sunglasses back on and pretended to ignore them. Chris and Rita waited a beat before looking at each other and turned to head back through the sliding glass doors.

While Chris and Rita had been outside getting nowhere with Vermosse, Devon had been in the kitchen talking to his girlfriend, the apathetic blonde who'd answered the door. Whatever her normal state of unfriendliness may have been, it soon became clear that her aloofness was aided at least in part by having recently taken some likely significant quantity of drugs, and not the energizing, happy-making kind. This meant it had taken a maddeningly long time to extract the very little useful information she had to offer.

As Chris and Rita reached Devon, she filled them in on the few details she'd gleaned. Gesturing toward the young woman who was leaning against the kitchen counter, staring at her nails, Devon said in a tone that hid none of her irritation, "Amber here says that another guy was staying here, but he left. You'll be shocked to hear that she can't remember _when_ he left, but I'm guessing sometime around when Blondie here was knocking back her morning cocktail of drugs and 'I don't give a fuck.'" Devon had neither patience nor sympathy for drug users. What could she say? She wasn't the nurturing, maternal type. Amber shot her a dirty look and turned to get a bottle of water from the fridge.

Devon turned back to Chris and Rita. "Anyway she says he might have left this morning. Or it might have been last night." Devon sighed. "It might have been Carlos. Or Enrique."

Chris and Rita gave a questioning look at the mention of this new name coming out of the blue, but Devon just shrugged. "Who knows? She can't remember. She says she doesn't know Vermosse well. She just met him a few days ago" continuing to talk about the girl as though she wasn't standing just three feet away from her, "but he's cool because he has all her favorite drugs." Devon paused half a second before adding, just to be mean, "herpes, too, from what I hear."

Rita snorted. Amber just rolled her eyes and walked away. Devon shook her head in disgust as she and Chris and Rita made their way to the front door. Dumb blondes were her least favorite demographic. Dumb, drug addicted blondes in particular.

They were all so focused on trying to get their anger under control as they walked out the door that they almost failed to notice the maid standing outside at the corner of the house. Even though she gave the appearance of working on the windows in some vague way, she more accurately seemed to be trying to get their attention, looking at them like she was hoping they'd notice her. Rita must have felt the woman's eyes on her because she took a second glance back to the house and walked over to the somewhat plump, and definitely nervous, middle-aged Salvadorian woman.

"Hi," Rita said gently. "Do you work here regularly?"

The woman nodded, glancing nervously over her shoulder toward the house.

Rita pulled out the photo of Carlos she had taken to Tina's motel room. "Have you seen this man here at the house?"

The woman had only to glance at it before nodding yes again, and again she looked around to make sure no one was observing her talking to Rita. She seemed to decide she was safe for the moment because she said quietly, in accented but easily understood Spanglish, "Si. Yes. Señor Carlos. He was here. But he got a phone call. It made him enujado." She gestured toward her face, which was scrunching up. "Furioso."

Rita nodded, "Angry. He got a phone call that made him angry?"

The maid nodded vehemently. "Si. He left right away."

"When was this?" Rita touched the woman's arm lightly, trying to make her feel safe, and anxious to get the information quickly.

"No sé. Maybe 45 minutes ago. An hour?" The woman shrugged and held up her palms indicating it could have been even longer than that. But clearly, they hadn't missed him by much.

"Do you know who the call was from," Rita asked quickly.

"No, Detective." The woman shook her head.

"Do you know where he was going when he left here?" Rita asked hopefully.

"No. Lo siento." The woman looked a bit pained, and she was glancing around nervously again.

Chris and Devon had walked closer to hear the conversation. "Someone tipped Ortega off," Rita said over her shoulder to them.

"Vermosse's ex?" Devon threw out the first possibility that came to her.

"It's worth checking out," Rita nodded.

"Detective?"

"Yes," Rita turned back to the maid who was pulling something from the front pocket of her uniform.

"This fell out of his jacket when he left." She held her hand palm up and extended it to Rita. Cupped in the center of her hand was a key. Rita picked it up and examined it, turning it front to back. Devon and Chris were at either shoulder now, looking at the object with her.

"Not a house key," Rita mused.

"Looks like a bike lock or storage unit key," Chris said thoughtfully.

Rita could have hugged the woman. "Thank you," she beamed, but the maid was already hustling off, afraid of getting caught by Vermosse.

Rita turned toward the other two cops and dangled the key in front of them. "A clue, my friends." They had a spring back in their steps as they made their way to their cars.

Devon was on the phone before they'd covered half the distance to the vehicles. She was getting herself handed up the chain of FBI command as quickly as possible—which was to say exasperatingly slowly thanks to the sluggish pace of government bureaucracy at work—in order to get Ortega's passport frozen. She didn't want him to be able to leave the country, at least not through any port that required him to show i.d.

By the time she'd finished getting the order put through, the three of them had already gotten back in their cars and driven a mile down the road to a public parking lot where they could pull over and work. While she had been navigating the FBI's phone tree, Chris and Rita had been quickly checking out storage unit rental facilities in the area, calling down the list they'd put together to try to match the code embossed on the key to the types of keys issued at each place. Twenty-five minutes later, they had called every storage unit business in a 15-mile radius and narrowed it down to eight possible places, and three probable ones, assuming Carlos was keeping his stuff close to the house-sitting gig. They would have to do a whole new list if he was keeping his goods closer to his parent's house, but they'd cross that bridge if they came to it. They split the list, with Rita and Devon taking the first place on the list, Chris the second. After they struck out at both of those facilities, they met up at their third best bet.

Paydirt.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

George had managed to fast-track them a search warrant thanks to Judge Malone being on call today. His Honour had been a major donor to Thomas Whitman's opponent last election and was still peeved his man hadn't unseated the Senator. A uniformed officer had delivered to Chris and Rita the all-important "show me the goods" paper less than an hour after they'd called in the request. This meant they were ready to roll when they flashed Ortega's photo and key at the eager young man—Jerrod, according to his smart white and blue name tag—standing duty at the front desk of Andy's Storage and Moving Company and he confirmed that he had, indeed, seen Ortega here before and yes, that key does look like it opens one of our units. "Oh yes, sir" he said earnestly to Chris and then, looking wide-eyed at Rita, "yes, ma'am. I seen him here two or three times. Mean fellow. Not surprised he's in trouble with the law." Jerrod sounded like he was doing a bad line reading for a Law and Order audition. To look at him you'd think he'd waited his whole life to get this close to some real police action. And a real cop who looked like Rita.

"Well, Jerrod, do you think you could look up his unit number for us?" Rita was trying to bring the young man's attention to the urgent task she needed him to perform on the computer, and to get him to stop staring at her face, where he was keeping his eyes glued in a clear effort to make sure they didn't drift southward.

Jerrod nearly saluted. "Yes. Yes. I can do that. No problemo. Happy to help. Lemme see…" he was typing, looking over to Rita and grinning at her. Then looking at Chris, who was giving him the evil eye, and quickly putting his attention right back on the computer monitor. "Yep. Here it is. 246. Climate controlled. Nice unit. Very secure. I can hook you up with a good deal on one if you like?" He side-eyed Rita hopefully.

"Uh, thanks. But I'm good." Rita brushed him off. "Which way to 246?"

"I'll take you!" Jerrod started to run from behind the desk.

"No, no. That's fine. This is police business, and we'll need to keep the area clear. You stay here and make sure no one bothers us, okay? You've been very helpful, Jerrod. If you could just point us in the right direction…?"

Andy's Storage consisted of ten long buildings in five rows, with each building housing multiple storage units. Buildings in the back of the lot weren't climate controlled and contained a great number of smaller storage sheds. The closer to the front the building was, the larger the individual units got. All had roll-up doors with various kinds of locks keeping them more, or often less, secure. Jerrod waved them to the third building from the front office, which included climate-controlled, mid-sized garage-like rooms where the itinerant, the down-on-their-luck, and the families with too much stuff they couldn't bear to part with kept their worldly possessions side-by-side. Tucked in between units with masses of plastic toddler toys middle-class kids had outgrown and hoarders' stashes of junk they swore was actually valuable collectibles was Unit 246. The detectives slipped the key easily into the padlock, rolled up the door, and found the room lined with rows of cardboard boxes stacked three and four high. They each took a box from the top of different stacks near the front, setting them down at the entrance to the unit. Rita got hers open first and immediately felt queasy. "Ugh. Uh…" She half-turned her head, wrinkled her nose, and silently cursed. Having caught her breath she looked back into the box and confirmed that it was filled with neatly-packed stacks of DVDs whose covers promised the viewer "torture porn" beyond what she had thought possible. There must have been 100 disks just in this box alone.

"Are you finding what I'm finding, Sammy?" Chris asked, his voice weary.

"Sick bastard." Rita said without a lot of oomph. She was thinking about Chloe and how she had looked on the beach the morning they found her. Rita closed up the cardboard box. They would do a quick inventory just to see if all of the boxes held the same nightmares or if there was something else here that might help them find Ortega, but she didn't want to spend any more time than she had to actually looking at this horror.

"Is he pushing this stuff just for the money, or do you think the creep gets off on it as well?" Chris was staring off in the middle distance. Angry. Taking deep breaths to get it under control.

"I don't know, Chris. And I don't care, so long as we find him. Let's see if there's anything that'll help us locate Ortega, and then let's get out of here." Rita's voice was hard enough to cut glass.

"I may have an answer for you," Devon said, looking up at the two of them from her own unfortunate find. She held up something small and black in her left hand: "A compact flash card. From a digital camera." She handed it to Rita.

Chris raised his eyebrows.

"We'll take it back to the shop and get forensics to see what's on it," Rita said, studying the card with a mix of anticipation and trepidation.

"And…" Devon cut back in, her voice rising. They both looked at her. In her right hand she was holding a pair of brass knuckles.

"Let me guess," Rita said.

Devon nodded. "The spike over the ring finger has a divot in it."

Chris whistled. "We got you, Ortega. We got you."

"Yeah, we just need to _find_ him" Rita reminded him.

They did a quick search through the storage unit, but they didn't find much other than more of the same.

"Looks like Ortega was diversifying, trafficking in porn as well as drugs," Devon said, "but apparently he thought he was selling instruction manuals."

"Took his work too much too heart, our Carlos," Chris mused, tapping his chest with his right forefinger. He was leaning hard on the crutch of dark humor cops relied on to keep some emotional distance from a tough case. They were walking back to their cars, leaving the storage unit to the uniformed officers who'd come to inventory the contents before moving it all to the PBPD evidence room.

"We'll have to see what we find on the camera card, but yeah, it looks like it." Devon was looking back and forth between Chris and Rita. "So where would he go? He didn't come here after he shot out of the Juno Beach house. Do we think he's stupid enough to run to mommy and daddy's place?"

"It's our only lead at this point, so let's see what the Whitmans have to say for their sociopath of a son," Rita directed.

They were just getting into their cars when Devon's phone rang. "Agent White," she answered, glancing quickly at Chris and Rita. Then her eyes got wide with rage. "Dammit! Dammit! Are you sure he was on it?... Well find OUT!" She hit the 'off' icon on the screen of her iPhone and cursed the lack of satisfaction in the gesture. She wanted to hit something. Or someone. "A private plane left the North Palm Beach County Airport 90 minutes ago. And you'll never guess who the plane is registered to," she said sarcastically. Without giving them a chance to answer, she spat "Raul Ortega. Carlos Ortega's uncle."

"Was there a flight plan? Do we know who was on the plane?" Rita asked incredulously as Chris smacked his hand against the roof of his cruiser.

"It's a small, private airport. Filing a flight plan with the FAA is recommended, but not required. Nothing came in for this trip. We only know it took off because one of my FBI colleagues knew about the plane from the family files and, after I ordered the freeze on Ortega's passport, called out there to see if it was in town. Someone on the ground crew let slip that two people had come in unexpectedly and hauled ass to get the plane ready and off the ground." Devon was massaging her temples now, trying to ward off a headache. "No word yet on who the two men were."

"North Palm Beach is the general aviation airport close to Juno Beach," Chris looked at Rita.

"If he made good time, he could have made it from Vargas's house to the airport in twenty minutes. If it was Vermosse's ex who called and tipped him off right after you two left her, Ortega would have had plenty of time to get the plane ready and get out of there before we'd even started hitting the storage facilities." Rita was angrily cutting the air with her hands. "This bastard has been two steps ahead of us the whole time."

"Forget the parents. Forget waiting for the FBI to call us back. Let's go to the airport and see if anyone there got a good look at who took that plane," Chris commanded.

Thirty minutes later, they were interviewing the skeleton crew working at North Palm Beach airport, just one of the four general aviation airports required by a small city that was so overrun with the super-rich. One maintenance worker was eventually willing to admit he had overheard the two men who took the plane say something about "Key West." He glanced briefly at the photo of Ortega they showed him, but said he didn't know if that's who'd taken the plane or not.

Chris grabbed him roughly by the collar of his mechanic overalls and pulled the man's face close to his own. Slowly and clearly he said, "look again. For real this time. And tell me if you saw this man here today or not." He pushed the man back from him and substituted the photo for his own angry face. The man looked at it, looked at Chris who was glaring at him, and still holding onto his collar. The mechanic pushed Chris's fist off his neck, glanced at the photo for another few seconds and seemed to be stalling for time. Finally he said, "yeah, I dunno, maybe that was him."

" _Maybe_ that was him?" Devon mocked. "Was it him or not, jackass?"

"Maybe. That's what I said."

Devon set her jaw. "I'm a **Federal Agent** , _Darren…_ " she said, looking at his uniform dismissively as she read the name tag on it. "I suggest you work on your memory issues and take another look at the photo Officer Lorenzo here has provided. I'd hate to have to find something about you to make a federal case about…" It was an empty threat, but the kind that usually worked on obstreperous, but not particularly bright or criminally-minded, witnesses. She wasn't really the cowboy type, but sometimes you had to play to people's worst stereotypes of the Bureau in order to break a big case. She didn't enjoy it, but she wasn't above it, either.

Chris wagged the photo helpfully, drawing Darren's attention back to it. Darren stared at it for a few minutes, seemingly trying to decide which action posed the greater risk to his personal safety, ratting out Ortega or stonewalling the cops. Proximity won. "Yeah, he was here. He got on the plane."

"Shit" Devon sighed. Rita turned and started walking back to the car.

"See, Darren, that wasn't so hard now was it?" Chris smacked him upside the head with an open hand before turning to follow Rita.

…

Back at their desks, they immediately started making calls. Devon to both the FBI and the FAA to see if Ortega had gone through the general aviation airport in Key West. Chris and Rita to various police departments and friends on the force in the Keys and Miami, just in case Ortega had opted for a different route. It was just under an hour's flying time from Palm Beach to Key West. If that's where Ortega had gone, it was possible he was still on the island. If so, they wanted him grounded there.

An hour after they had gotten back to the station, they received confirmation that Ortega and someone piloting for him had indeed taken his uncle's small plane to Key West. But apparently they had no intention of leaving so little distance between themselves and the cops. The pilot had radioed ahead to get another, larger, plane ready to leave as soon as Ortega arrived. It was already off the ground.

"He's flown the coop," they had to report to Lipschitz.

"What do you mean _flown the coop_?" Harry's voice went up an octave as he pounded his desk with his fist.

"Someone tipped him off that we were coming to Vargas's house to find him; Vermosse's ex, we think," Chris explained. "He had enough lead time to get to his family's jet and get out of town before we tracked him down, Cap. He made it to Key West and took a second flight from there." Chris sounded as dejected as he felt, which didn't stop Lipschitz's nostrils from flaring.

"The second plane filed a flight plan and manifest with the FAA, probably to avoid raising immediate suspicion and giving them a chance to get into international airspace before we knew they were gone. The pilot seems to have been just some flier-for-hire who regularly makes extra cash chauffeuring any rich person who needs him. The name they gave for the passenger was Jesus Ortega, Carlos's cousin. But a colleague in Miami checked, and the cousin's currently eating a steak dinner at his favourite spot on Lincoln Road in South Beach. So all money is on Carlos as the real passenger." Devon's hands were on her hips, her lips pursed, eyes narrowing. She didn't take well to feeling helpless and outsmarted.

"And where, pray tell, did they say there were going on their little vacation?" Lipschitz's sarcasm was only ramping up.

"Haiti." Devon said simply.

"Haiti?" Lipschitz raised his eyebrows in disbelief.

"Haiti was close enough to reach in the small plane they were flying. And even though they have an extradition treaty with the U.S., the wheels of justice turn rather slowly there. Plus, both the police and immigration are easily persuaded to look the other way if you have the kind of cash Ortega flashes," Rita explained.

"We've talked to the consulate in Port au Prince and are working on an extradition warrant." Devon chimed in again.

Harry just stared at them, shaking his head. "Unbelievable…." He sighed. Giving the detectives a serious look over the top of his glasses he said, "Listen, you three did great work today. Keep on it. Good work." He paused, shaking his head again. "The rich. They think they're above the law. But they're not. We're going to get this guy." He looked at Rita. "You did good, Rita. We're going to get him."

…

A mere 24 hours later, they were back in Lipschitz's office with another update.

As their new information had come from the feds, Devon took the lead. "The plane Carlos was on made a last minute diversion to the Dominican Republic, not Haiti. By the time the State Department had gotten that information sorted and notified local authorities, Ortega was out of sight." Up until now, Devon's tone had been professional and unemotional. But as she continued, a certain weariness started to kick in. "We'll keep scouting for him on both sides of the island, but Ortega's not much for roughing it. Our best guess is that he's on his way to the greater comforts of Vietnam, where he keeps a vacation property. We're getting agents in place in case that is where he's headed. If he hasn't landed yet, there's a chance we can catch him on his way into the country. But assuming that's where he is or is headed, and in the quite likely event he's already there, Vietnam is convenient for Ortega and tricky for us."

Lipschitz raised an eyebrow.

"They don't extradite criminals to the US," Rita explained.

"So where does that leave us," Cap asked, looking pained. This was partly due to the irritating turn in the case, and partly due to another spasm in his lower back.

"I'll keep working it through the federal side of things," Devon said. "We've got agents all over Southeast Asia who now have enough pictures of Ortega to wallpaper their offices."

"And you'll keep us in the loop," Chris and Cap said at the same time, both looking at her seriously.

"You know it. You all worked too hard on this not to be the first to get a call when we find him."

"If we find him," Rita said softly.

"We'll find him." Devon's voice conveyed more certainty than she felt. In Vietnam, it would be difficult, but hardly impossible, for Ortega to disappear and stay hidden for a good long time if he wanted. On the other hand, she believed in her co-workers and knew they'd work hard to find him. She also knew Carlos wasn't the type to stay out of the action forever. She figured him as too cocky, and too eager to make a name for himself, to stay away for more than a few years, and she said as much to her new friends in the PBPD.

"Agent White, you've been a huge help on this one. But don't forget," Cap said, pointing at Rita and Chris, "Lance and Lorenzo here get a crack at this guy once he's back in the U S of A."

Chris and Rita just smiled patiently at the Cap, appreciative as always of his protectiveness of them. Devon smiled, too, as she nodded.

Chris and Rita walked Devon outside to say their good-byes. "I'll call you with any updates," Devon was saying as they approached her car.

"And you'll be back in September, for the Night Moves fundraiser," Rita reminded her.

"Absolutely. I've got some more ideas for the silent auction. Let's talk next week, once I'm settled back in down in Miami." Devon and Rita exchanged a friendly hug. Then Devon looked at Chris who flashed that famous Lorenzo grin and gave a mock salute. Devon just rolled her eyes while Rita laughed, a bit of a twinkle coming back into her deep green eyes.

As Devon drove off, Chris and Rita looked at each other for a long moment, then silently turned and walked side-by-side back inside to tackle the never-ending pile of paperwork on their desks. They were still at it more than an hour later when Lipschitz came out of his office. Standing just outside his door frame, he looked at each of them, shook his head and then barked, "Lance! Lorenzo!"

Chris and Rita shot each other a quizzical look as they turned their heads toward Harry.

"Get out of here,"he said, his voice softening. "Take a break. Get some dinner. You've earned it."

Rita looked at Chris, one eyebrow raised. Then she turned her eyes back to Harry, and then back to Chris again. A grin was spreading across his face as he and Rita made eye contact and both nodded. "You got a deal, Cap!" Chris laughed lightly. "Hah!"

Rita was already straightening up the files she'd had open and quickly shoving stuff into desk drawers. "Thanks, Cap," she chirped as she grabbed her purse.

"Just don't be late tomorrow morning. The Shannon case isn't going to solve itself. And apparently Smith and Jackson aren't going to solve it either, " Harry yelled to their backs as they were half-way to the squad room doors. Detectives Smith and Jackson pretended not to hear him. They were perfectly capable, and might be able to close the Shannon case given enough time, but apparently they were still on Harry's shit list for their juvenile antics last week. Harry wasn't a fan of practical jokes, at least not when they were at his expense. And their switching his decaf coffee for regular late in the day just to see him get increasingly jittery had led to Harry having difficulty sleeping for days. Worse, it was all he could do to keep Frannie from coming in and "giving those boys a stern talking to." This kind of trouble he didn't need from his own detectives.

The Sams decided to make the most of their unexpectedly early end to the work day. They grabbed some beer and pizza and headed over to Rita's place. They were quiet at first, just enjoying each other's company. Once they were ready to hit their second slices, Chris broke the companionable silence. "So Devon's coming back for the Night Moves auction?"

"Yeah, she seemed to connect with the work. I think she supports the cause. Even though she doesn't want kids of her own, she's committed to helping out the 'strays,' as you like to call them." Rita tilted her head toward Chris as she offered him a wry smile.

"Another cop with a big heart. Just like you, Sammy," he said with a softness in his voice. Rita's generous spirit and big heart were just two of the many things he loved about her.

"Well, I don't know about _that_ , Sam." Rita shrugged lightly, her voice soft and dropping a bit shyly. "But I do care about those kids. And I want Ortega to pay for what he did."

"He will, Sammy." Chris swiped a bit of her hair back from her forehead with his index finger. "Eventually, we'll get him." He had to believe that. He knew they might not, but he had to believe that they would.

"So," Rita said, changing the subject to something more pleasant, "are you sorry to see Devon go?" She was teasing him. She knew how much he appreciated good-looking women, and he and Devon had certainly gotten along. "You two seemed to work pretty well together there partner." Her eyes were dancing again. Chris was pretty sure she was teasing him.

"Well, you know" he said, shrugging his shoulders, playing the confident rogue, "women like me. What can I say?" He laughed, and Rita tossed a bit of pizza crust at him that nailed him right in the center of his forehead. "Hey!" he yelped as they both started giggling.

"What about you, Sammy? You like being a threesome?"

Rita just rolled her eyes at his poor attempt at humour. "I liked Devon a lot." She paused, and then said thoughtfully as she caught and held his gaze, "but we make a good team."

"Yeah we do, Sammy," Chris said, his tone softer and more serious now. "Yes we do." Their eyes stayed locked on each other slightly longer than "just friends" might do. And then they each took a bite of pizza and looked elsewhere.

"So do you think if Devon had stuck around longer that you and she might have become more, um, friendly?" Rita asked, trying to lighten the mood again, but then realizing this might not have been the safest of subjects.

Chris's eyes popped wide. "Um…" he started to blush. "Naw. No. I mean, she's a very attractive woman, don't get me wrong."

"Uh huh," Rita said, rolling her eyes at him again.

"But, you know, office romances…." He trailed off, but then said in a rush, "I mean, sometimes they can probably work, you know, in some cases…" he trailed off again.

"But I think Devon learned her lesson the hard way on that one," Rita saved him from having to figure out how to finish his thought.

Chris looked at her, interested and bemused. "How do you mean?"

Rita shared with Chris the story of Devon's failed affair with her partner, ending with how they had to split up the teams in their unit and now had an incredibly awkward professional relationship. "They had a great thing going as partners, you know? And then they crossed the line." Rita was looking meaningfully at Chris now. "And they blew it."

Chris held Rita's gaze a second, and then smiled, pointing at her with the crust of his fourth slice of pizza. Honestly, Rita didn't know how he could eat so much and stay in the kind of shape he did. "That's the great thing about us, Sammy. We got it perfect and we know it."

Rita's heart warmed. Chris was her best friend. And even though, every once in a while, she found herself having those "what if" thoughts, they passed quickly. She loved him too much to risk his friendship for what she was sure would be terrific sex, but feared would also be a regretted one-night-stand. "I know, Sam. We're too smart to mess up a good thing." Her green eyes brightened as they again locked onto Chris's deep blue ones. She saw so much respect and love in them.

They laughed easily and leaned into each other, their shoulders pressed together. Chris gave Rita's temple a friendly kiss. Then he grabbed the TV remote in one hand and with his other led Rita to the couch. As they were sitting down, he turned on the Bogie & Bacall double feature: _The Maltese Falcon_ and _The Big Sleep_ were just about to start playing on the classic movie channel. Chris draped his arm over the back of the couch, his fingers resting lightly on Rita's shoulder. She snuggled into his side and they stayed there in the flickering light of the TV, enjoying each other's company and quoting all their favorite dialogue along with the two actors who'd made such a great team, professionally and personally.

 **The end?**


End file.
